


All I Need

by Featherbelle



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Depression, F/M, Friendship, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-01-01
Updated: 2014-12-31
Packaged: 2018-03-04 15:53:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3073568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Featherbelle/pseuds/Featherbelle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bones' girlfriend is having a very hard time dealing after the death of her parents.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All I Need

**_May 2260_ **

The transporter whirred and shimmered, taking the person that stood on the platform away. The ship’s doctor stood there watching until every spark had faded and then turned on his heel and walked out of the transporter room. Tears that he refused to shed blurred his vision, and halfway down the hall he stopped and punched the wall. Hard.

Booted feet sounded behind him and a hand reached out and grabbed his arm before he took another swing at the unsuspecting wall. “Whoa, whoa, Bones, what’s wrong?” his friend and Captain Jim Kirk asked, concerned.

“She’s gone, Jim,” Leonard McCoy replied, grief choking his throat.

“It’s just shore leave, Bones, she’ll be back,” Jim consoled, patting the doctor on the back.

“Check your message queue,” Bones said, his voice strained. “She put in for a transfer.”

Jim’s ice blue eyes hardened. “Come on, we’re going to get to the bottom of this.” He took Bones by the elbow and towed him towards the office attached to his quarters. “Sit,” Jim ordered while he checked the PADD on his desk. He quickly found the message Bones had mentioned, Maren’s request for a transfer effective at the end of her shore leave.

Jim sat back in his chair, contemplating his moves. He was very angry at this woman for hurting his best friend. Part of him wanted to approve the transfer, just so she’d go away and his friend could heal. Kirk stole a glance at the doctor over the top edge of the PADD. Another part of him thought that without Maren MacKenna around, Leonard McCoy might never recover. He’d taken a big risk opening his heart again after the disaster his divorce had been. Jim had never seen him happier than when he’d walked the halls of the Enterprise with Maren on his arm. Having made up his mind, he slapped the PADD down on the desk with a clatter. His eyes glittered. “She’s not going anywhere, Bones.”

McCoy looked up in stunned surprise. “But…she wants out.”

“She’s a big girl, Bones. She ought to have learned by now that you don’t always get what you want in life. And I think she forgot, I’m the Captain. I have to approve transfers, and they have to have good reason behind them. Suddenly not being able to stand the sight of your boyfriend doesn’t count.”

“Jim, I appreciate the thought, but you can’t force her to stay,” Bones protested weakly.

“The hell I can’t. You two can’t work anything out if she runs away like a scalded cat. And if she’s going to make you miserable, then _I’m_ gonna make her miserable,” Jim grinned. “But…just so she can’t accuse me of taking my best friend’s side…”

“But _you are_ taking my side,” Bones interrupted him, life starting to come back into his eyes.

“Of course I am, Bones! What do you take me for? But as I was saying, just to keep everything kosher, I am going to check and see if there’s anywhere I could send her. I don’t think there is, to be honest, and we _do_ need her here.” Jim did check the computer systems and he was right, there were no currently available spaces on any of the other ships currently stationed within several light years of Earth, or dirtdown at the Academy. But, he told himself, even if there had been, he wasn’t going to let her leave his ship without a damn good explanation as to why she had ripped out his best friend’s heart and stomped on it.

***

Bones moved listlessly throughout the rest of the day, only speaking when absolutely necessary, his bedside manner worse than usual if that was possible. He’d gotten so used to having Maren around, he didn’t know what he was going to do. The whole ship felt different without her. Jim had said he was going to find her and give her a piece of his mind. Bones had shaken his head, wincing internally at the thought of a fight between his fiery girlfriend and his hardheaded best friend. Practically he’d kept two beds free in sickbay because he knew if Jim went near her as mad as he was, they’d tear each other apart.

When his shift in sickbay was over, he headed back to his quarters, having to force himself not to swing by Maren’s rooms as was his usual habit. They often had dinner together, and then played poker, which Bones had had to teach her, or sometimes they’d go swimming on the recreation deck. He realized his thinking was very depressing, but at the moment he didn’t want dinner if Maren wasn’t there to share it.

Once in his quarters, he stripped off his uniform and put on a casual shirt then poured himself a drink. As he did so, his gaze happened to fall on a framed photograph of himself and Maren from the rededication ceremony for the Enterprise the year after Khan crashed the Vengeance into Starfleet Headquarters. There was a sadness in her eyes, but Bones had understood the poignant undertones in her movements and speech that day. Now, he picked up the bottle of bourbon and his glass, turned his back on the photograph, and proceeded to try to drink himself into a stupor.

He could usually hold his liquor fairly well, although he wished that weren’t true. He wanted to get drunk. He wanted, for just a little while, to forget. Forget that he could still feel her presence in this room. Forget that he could still hear the ghost of her laughter and smell her perfume. Forget that he could feel her, taste her… 

A mix of longing, frustration and anger made him bolt upright in bed and hurl the still half-full glass against the wall, shattering as it impacted from the force of his throw. “Damn it, Moira!” he shouted. “Why did you have to leave me, darlin’?”

He knew it was pathetic but didn’t care. He curled up on what had been her side of the bed and buried his face in her pillows, inhaling what was left of her scent. As he fell asleep, his traitorous mind threw him four years back in time, to when he had first met the love of his life.

_Starfleet_ _Medical College_ _, January 2256_

_Bones ran down the hall, grumbling under his breath. He was going to be late for class and it was all Jim’s fault. His, and the girl he’d brought back to their Academy dorm room. He loved his best friend, he really did, but there were some days he wanted to request a room all to himself. He was in such a hurry that he wasn’t paying complete attention to where he was going, and ended up colliding with the first person that crossed his path. Everything both of them were carrying went flying._

_“Damn it, Brenna! I am going to murder you!” an angry feminine voice snarled somewhere below him. Bones crouched down to help her pick up their things and found himself staring into a pair of striking hazel eyes that were currently on fire. He laughed. “Well, I guess I can say I’m glad I’m not Brenna.”_

_“Oh, I’m sorry, it’s just that my roommate has horrible timing,” she apologized. “I’ve missed the entire first week of classes because of a family emergency, which they understand, but now I’m going to be late for my first day because she had to go home with some guy she met last night and couldn’t be bothered to come back to our room at a decent damned hour,” the girl grumbled._

_Bones snorted. “I know what you mean. My best friend is like that. He’s a great guy, but there are times I wish he had his own room for his harem.” He stuck out his hand. “Leonard McCoy.”_

_“Maren MacKenna,” she replied with a smile, taking his hand in hers._

_“Maren. That’s a lovely name,” he said honestly, falling into step with her. “What class are you heading to? I can walk you there if you like.”_

_“Oh thank you, I’d appreciate it. And I’m named for my mother, sort of. Her name is Mairi, and both are names are derivatives of Mary.”_

_Bones stopped suddenly in the middle of the hall. “Wait. Is your roommate about your height with blonde hair and green eyes?”_

_Maren looked up at him. “Yes, why?”_

_Bones began to laugh. “I never caught her name, but I think your roommate might be the girl my best friend Jim brought home last night. I thought I heard her muttering something about being friends with Battle Axe MacKenna’s daughter.” He turned to her. “ **Captain** MacKenna is your mother?” Bones began to turn pale. _

_“Yes, and now I’m late to her Anatomy and Physiology class. Why do you think I want to carve Brenna into little bitty pieces with a laser scalpel?” Maren replied crossly, beginning to run._

_Bones began to jog alongside her. “We’re both late. Damn it, Jim,” he grumbled._

_“Jim?” Maren giggled. “Jim **Kirk**?”_

_“Yes, that’s my best friend, roommate and occasional torturer.”_

_She finally stopped outside her mother’s classroom and caught her breath. “You know, Dr. McCoy, I think this might be the beginning of a beautiful friendship,” she smiled at him before opening the classroom door. Bones agreed with her. That is, if Maren’s mother didn’t kill him first._

***

Bones awoke the next morning with a pounding headache, and an equally pounding determination. He was not going to let Maren go without a helluva fight. He could not think of a single reason why she should want to leave him. Sure, they fought sometimes, all couples did, but never over anything bad enough that would cause one of them to walk away. Neither of them had ever cheated on the other. When they had first met, Jim had flirted with her, but it was more to irk the hell out of Bones than anything else.

As he crawled into the shower, a smile creased his face at the memory of a stinging rebuke Maren had given Jim once when the three of them were studying together. “What do I want with ground beef when I have delicious steak at home?” Unperturbed, Jim had asked, “How delicious?” Maren had just curled contentedly into Bones’ side and said, “The best I’ve ever had.” Of course later Jim had pestered Bones relentlessly about her comment, and Bones had just smirked at Jim as if to say, ‘Like I’m going to tell you’.

Done with his shower, he dressed in a black Starfleet issue turtleneck, slacks and boots. He knew the death of Maren’s parents in the attack on Starfleet had hurt her deeply, and he had done his best to be there for her. He briefly wondered if something to do with their deaths still haunted her and that was a part of her reasoning. Well, he thought to himself as he left his quarters and headed for sickbay, it was certainly understandable but once the thought entered his head, he kicked himself for not having seen it sooner. He was certified in both general medical practice and psychology. He _should have_ seen it. “Damn it, man,” he berated himself. “You’re a fool.”

Irritated with himself now, Bones stomped into sickbay and didn’t even look up when one of the nurses called out a greeting. He went to where the stimulants were kept, and grabbed a hypospray of inaprovaline and jabbed it into his arm. Spinning on his heel, he crashed into Jim, who had been standing right behind him and had seen what he’d done. With a manic grin on his face, Jim clapped him on the arm. “Morning, Bones,” he called loudly. “Sleep well?”

Bones narrowed his bloodshot green eyes at his longtime friend. “Go to hell.”

“Nope, sorry, buddy, no can do.” He dogged Bones’ heels as the doctor went into his office. Jim let the PADD in his hands fall to Bones’ desk with a clatter that made the irritable doctor visibly wince.

“Damn it, Jim, knock it the hell off.” Bones opened a drawer in his desk and pulled out a bottle of ginger ale. He poured himself a glass and eyed the PADD with no little apprehension. “What’s that?”

“Our orders just came in. We’re going on a five-year mission.” Jim watched as Bones dug around in another drawer and came up with a small blue velvet box. “Um, Bones…she said no, remember?”

“Yeah, well, she wasn’t herself. She still isn’t, and I’ve got to make her see that,” Bones said, downing the last of the ginger ale and pocketing the box as he stood. “It’s only been a little over a year since the disaster at the Academy. Jim, her parents died that day. The ceremony today was hard on her. The more I think about it, the more I realize the rededication brought everything back, and she’s grieving all over again, when we all thought she’d gotten to the point of being functional again.” Bones rose from his desk chair and picked up the PADD, scanning its information quickly. “Mind if I borrow this?”

“Not at all. Go right ahead.” Jim’s blue eyes burned with sympathy. “You do whatever you have to do to get our girl back, you hear me, Bones?”

Bones laughed dryly. “Good god, man, that’s all I need. If I tell her you said that…”

“Hey, if it gets her back on the ship…” Jim laughed back. “Be my guest.”

Bones rolled his eyes. “You say that now. You know, yesterday when I thought you were serious about going after her yourself, I kept two beds free in here all day, because I knew if you two went near each other, you’d tear each other to shreds.”

“Nah, you know I’d never really hurt her. Throw her in the brig maybe…” Jim teased, and ducked as Bones half-heartedly swung a fist at him. “Seriously, Bones. Take all the time you need to convince her. We have a few days before we absolutely _have_ to ship out. You have a competent staff in here. The Enterprise can do without you for a while. But it sounds like your better half can’t.”

“My better half?” Bones looked at Jim as though he’d grown two heads.

“Yeah, I really think she is. Why do you think I was so damned mad at her?”

Bones just rolled his eyes and shook his head as he left sickbay and headed for the transporter room. On the way there, he hit his comm badge. “Hey, Scotty, can you meet me in the transporter room?”

“Och aye, Dr. McCoy, I’ll be right there,” came the immediate reply.

A few minutes later found both men in the transporter room, the younger of the two glaring daggers at the hated contraption, for all the usual reasons as well as the fact that it had been the device that had taken the woman he loved away from him. Now he hoped it would redeem itself and reunite him with her. “Scotty, you still have the coordinates Maren beamed to yesterday, right?”

“Aye, I do, Doctor McCoy,” Scotty replied, accessing the computer quickly. “I can beam you directly to her.”

“Just make sure you get me there in one piece, Mr. Scott,” Bones grumbled as he climbed up on the transporter platform. Before he could utter another word of protest, Scotty activated the transporter, and Bones was whisked away.

***

Maren MacKenna materialized outside the house she’d grown up in. She looked up at the faded façade sadly. She still owned the house and property, but no one had lived here in nearly a year. Maren hadn’t wanted to go anywhere near the place after the deaths of her parents. Taking a deep breath, she marched up the steps and went inside, placing her Starfleet issue duffle bag just inside the door.

Maren wandered through her childhood home, letting memories both made and unmade wash over her. She saw herself as a child running through the house, laughing, as she was chased by her father. Looking up to the top of the stairs, she saw Leonard standing there with a broad smile on his handsome face, his arms outstretched in greeting. Tears fell unchecked down her cheeks as she fled the apparition, running full tilt out the back door and not stopping until she reached the far end of the property.

A single headstone stood prominently there on the hill, the carved names and inscription standing out in dull relief.

**ADMIRAL JEFFERSON MACKENNA 2205-2259**

**CAPTAIN MAIRI MACKENNA 2210-2259**

**_Beloved parents. Gone too soon._ **

Maren fell to her knees, still sobbing. “Mom, Dad, why did you have to die? Why did you have to be there that day? I need you. I need your help. I was stupid and I left him. I love him, Mom…why do I always have to be so stupid and scared and screw everything up?” Despite her heartfelt and desperate plea, no one answered her.

She sat there in front of the stone for a long time, a mix of emotions swirling inside her. Afternoon turned to evening and evening to day again as she sat there sifting through everything in her mind. Anger at Khan for taking her parents from her. Grief at the unnecessary loss. A bittersweet combination of heartache and love for Leonard. She didn’t know what to do anymore. The deaths of her parents were pointless and unfair. For a long time now she had just been going through the motions of life, barely doing what it took to get by day in and day out. She’d lost her usual appetite and had sleeping problems, both of which she knew Leonard had attributed to normal patterns of grieving, and she had let him. But now she realized she hadn’t been grieving normally. She had avoided everything to do with her parents: this place – her childhood home, the rebuilt Headquarters, the reading of her parents’ will. A humorless chuckle escaped her lips at that memory. Bless his heart, Jim had gone to the reading in her place, as her Captain and her friend. The only thing at all that had kept her the least bit sane was Leonard himself. She had clung to him in her grief, and now she realized, more than was healthy. A part of her had been terrified of being alone. Another part of her had been equally terrified that if she let him out of her sight he’d end up dying as her parents had. She now knew that too, was far from normal. She needed help. And she had alienated the few people that could help her. Maren wrestled between returning to the Enterprise and asking Leonard and Jim for help, and the irrational thought that because she had been so rotten and pushed them away that Jim was likely to kick her off the ship if he laid eyes on her again. She was so lost in these thoughts that she didn’t immediately notice footsteps behind her.

“Darlin’?” Bones called to her softly, not wanting to startle her.

She turned her head at the sound of his voice, cringing internally at the gentleness of his tone. She didn’t think she deserved his forgiveness. Maren knew Leonard McCoy well enough to know he had probably thought she was leaving him, especially after the spur of the moment transfer request she had sent to the Captain. And from the look she saw on his face now, she also knew he’d likely forgiven her for her foolishness. _The best thing that’s ever happened to you, and you nearly let him go because you can’t deal with the loss of your parents. Áine, you are a damned fool,_ she thought to herself.

“Leonard, what are you doing here?” she asked, her voice cracking from both unshed tears and several hours of silence. She took her time unfolding herself from where she’d been sitting in front of the stone and rose shakily to her feet.

Bones approached her carefully, not wanting to upset her further. He had his suspicions about what might be wrong with her, and the last thing he wanted now was to push her away or cause her to run again. “I want you to come back to the Enterprise with me.”

She sighed and looked down at her feet. Just as she thought. He was going to forgive her without her even having to ask. She blinked back tears. Now was not the time to cry. Now was the time to fess up. She needed to acknowledge that she had a problem, a big one, and that she needed help. And if anyone could help her through this one, she knew the man standing in front of her now could, and would. “Do you see what that is, Leonard?” she asked him, pointing behind her at her parents’ tombstone.

“I’m not here for a tour, sweetheart. I’m here to take you home,” he replied, keeping his tone soft and level.

_Damn the man for not making this easy on me_ , she thought, and her irritability came through in her voice. “ _Do you see what that is, Leonard?_ ” she repeated, the pain in her beginning to leak through now.

Leonard heard not only what she was literally asking, but the pain beneath it, and put as much love into his voice as he could. He wanted to make sure she knew he loved and supported her. “A memorial stone, sweetheart.”

“Not just any memorial stone, Leonard. _My parents’ stone._ My God, Leonard,” she said, swiping angrily at the tears beginning to fall. Her voice changed to a whisper as she looked him in the eyes. “They weren’t even supposed to be there that day.”

He was completely stunned at that admission. As he had looked back on her behavior of the past year or so, he had come to the conclusion that her grieving was worse than originally thought, but this…blew him away. He looked back at her, his green eyes gone as wide as the Enterprise’s deflector dish. “ _WHAT?_ ”

“No, they weren’t. The transport they were going to take to Risa for their anniversary trip had mechanical issues and needed another day for repair. So they decided to swing by their offices at the Academy and tie up a few loose ends…”

“Damn it, Moira, why didn’t you tell me?” he cut her off sharply, a touch of anger in his voice at the fact that she had hidden this from him.

A sad smile lifts the corners of her mouth at his use of his pet name for her. “I was enough of a godawful wreck, Leonard. And you were being run off your feet over at Starfleet Medical with the wounded from the attack…”

Bones closed the distance between them in broad strides and put a finger to her lips. “Maren Áine MacKenna, if that isn’t the most asinine thing I have ever heard you say! Don’t you dare say you didn’t want to burden me further or cause me more stress. Damn it, woman!” He shook his head in frustration. “I’m your doctor as well as the man who loves you. This was something I should have known!”

She reached a hand up and laid it against his cheek. “I’m sorry,” she said softly.

He cupped her face in his hands. “So am I. I have a damned PhD in psychology, and I _know_ you. I know how you get when you’re upset. I should have kept a better eye on you. I should have…”

“No, Leonard, don’t do this to yourself,” she told him, putting her own finger to his lips in direct imitation of what he had done to her moments before.

“Why the hell not?” he snapped. “I love you, Maren, it’s my job to take care of you. And I’ve been doing a piss poor job of it.”

She sighed, and took the final leap of faith necessary to begin her journey towards healing. “Not really. I’ve kept things from you, things I shouldn’t have.”

Bones pulled her fully into his arms, tucking her head beneath his chin and wrapping his arms around her tightly. He felt her nestle close to him and wrap her own arms around his waist. “Tell me darlin’. Tell me now,” he pleaded with her.

“You’d better come into the house with me then. This might take a while,” she said, taking his hand in hers and leading him into her house. She ignored the overwhelming urge to dawdle by giving him a tour of the place. He’d said when he got here he wasn’t interested in a tour, so she led him to the living room and pulled him down with her to sit on the couch. Bones pulled Maren into his arms. “Talk to me, Moira.”

“I am angry at Khan. He took my parents from me. I hate him, actually. I wish he was dead. I wish Starfleet would let me kill him,” she said, staring off into the distance as she began to tell him everything she had been thinking, feeling, and ultimately hiding from him over the last several months.

“Damn it, it wasn’t their time, Leonard! It’s not fair! Dad was only fifty-four, Mom forty-nine. They should have and could have had more time. They should be there when we get married. They won’t even get to see their grandchildren!” Tears began to fall unchecked down her cheeks and she let them.

Bones felt hope flare in him at the way she phrased some of that. _When we get married…grandchildren._ That meant that she wasn’t so far gone that she wanted to be rid of him or god forbid, end her life in order to join her parents in death as some people desperately lost in grief thought to do. He rubbed her back soothingly. “What else, sweetheart?”

She snorted deprecatingly. “Did you completely miss all of my damned avoidance issues? Take a look at this place. There is dust everywhere. It’s a colossal mess. I haven’t set foot near here since before they died, and afterwards, I couldn’t stand to be anywhere near anything that reminded me of them, and this would have been the worst reminder of all. A huge empty house full of nothing but ghosts and memories.”

Maren pulled away from him long enough to swipe at her eyes and then curled against him. He wrapped his arms around her as she continued speaking. “Remind me to thank Jim for going to the reading of the will for me. He didn’t have to do that.”

“He wanted to. He is your friend,” Bones told her as he took one of her small hands in his.

“He doesn’t hate me?” she asked, looking up at him with trepidation.

“No,” Bones chuckled. “Although he is contemplating throwing you in the brig.”

“I deserve it.”

“Well, if he throws you in there, he’ll have to put me in with you, because I am not letting you out of my sight, woman,” Bones declared heatedly.

“Thank you, Leonard,” she said softly, stroking his cheek with her hand. “I clung to you like a burr for far too long. I didn’t want to be alone and I was too afraid of losing you just like I lost Mom and Dad. None of that was rational or healthy. I know that now.”

“So what are we going to do about it?” Bones asked her seriously.

Maren looked up at the man she loved with tears in her eyes. This was it. The final step. Her voice came out a broken whisper. “Help me, Leonard…please.”

The Chief Medical Officer of the USS Enterprise let out a breath he didn’t even realize he’d been holding and pulled the woman he loved more than life itself onto his lap and wrapped his arms around her so tightly he wasn’t even sure she could breathe. “Of course I will, darlin’. Of course I will. _We all will._ Now, let’s go home.”


End file.
